From jek@ams.org Tue May 19 17:44:40 1998 Received: from math.ams.org (math.ams.org [130.44.210.14]) by euclid.math.temple.edu (8.8.5/8.8.5) with SMTP id RAA03519 for ; Tue, 19 May 1998 17:44:39 -0400 (EDT) Received: from axp14.ams.org by math.ams.org via smtpd (for euclid.math.temple.edu [155.247.28.2]) with SMTP; 19 May 1998 21:44:07 UT Received: from mr3.mr.ams.org by AXP14.AMS.ORG (PMDF V5.1-8 #1) with SMTP id <01IX85IN08SG001L1F@AXP14.AMS.ORG> for zeilberg@euclid.math.temple.edu; Tue, 19 May 1998 17:43:54 EST Received: from mr4.mr.ams.org by mr3.mr.ams.org; (5.65v3.2/1.1.8.2/30Oct96-1013AM) id AA01561; Tue, 19 May 1998 17:43:52 -0400 Received: from localhost by mr4.mr.ams.org; (5.65v3.2/1.1.8.2/02May97-0140PM) id AA25681; Tue, 19 May 1998 17:43:51 -0400 Date: Tue, 19 May 1998 17:43:51 -0400 (EDT) From: Jane Kister Subject: Math Reviews and short papers To: zeilberg@euclid.math.temple.edu Cc: "John H. Ewing" , rkd@ams.org Message-id: MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Content-Length: 2417 Status: RO Dear Professor Zeilberger, John Ewing passed on to us a copy of your Opinion 24 about Mathematical Reviews' coverage of short articles, in particular three by your close associate, S. B. Ekhad. First, let me say that each book or article is considered individually by the editors. There is no policy that says, for example, that every 1-page paper is to treated by a bibliographic listing with no further review. However, it is probably true that the percentage of very short papers that get bibliographic-only treatment (rather than full review treatment) is higher than it is for all papers. Secondly, MR has recently increased the percentage of items given bibliographic-only treatment. This was necessary because there was a significant increase in the number of items received for review starting about a year ago after several years of very little growth, and it is continuing to increase, but there has been no increase in our available resources. The 1996 CMP contained 58692 items, the 1997 CMP 61907 items and the projection for 1998 CMP is that it will contain around 65000 items.) Various factors come into play in the decision on coverage of an item. The aim, for items selected for coverage, is to help the reader to decide whether or not to read the original item, within the given constraints. For short papers with exact descriptive titles and by established authors, a title listing is likely to give the information the user needs for this decision. Certainly, a thoughtful review would add extra information and insight but the chances of getting such a review for a 1-page paper are, in our experience, small. We did look again at the three papers you listed. We feel that the treatment given was appropriate and consistent with our general guidelines for bibliographic-only listings. I think all the MR editors would agree that in an ideal world each paper would be given a full review in MR. Unfortunately, libraries (the subscribers) are not able to support this level of treatment for all items (nor do we have enough reviewers to give thoughtful reviews to every item we cover). We believe it is important to give comprehensive coverage of the literature (everything within the scope of MR is at least listed) and we will make every effort to continue to do this as the literature grows. Yours sincerely, Jane Kister Associate Executive Editor Mathematical Reviews